three beeps after installing faster ram

friend upgraded to 16GB ram and gave me his 2 x 4GB PC3-12800S sticks to put into my imac 2.66 core 2 duo with 2 x 2GB PC3-8500 sticks. I removed my 4GB and installed the 8GB. Seated very well (well as far as I can tell anyway)

Macs are very fussy about memory and must have low density modules, not cheaper high density PC shop modules. Go to OWC and/or Crucial ~ Mac specialists for your memory needs. The 2008/09/10 2.66GHz iMac, last of the 2.66, use PC3-8500 modules.

so just to be clear. The 8GB was ram that came out of my friend's mac.

Mac's can't use faster memory than what it originally had? (I'm a recent toe dipper in the mac pond)

Same answer as Harry mentioned...wrong ram. The three beeps is a specific alert for wrong or bad ram installed.

- Nick

- Too many "beachballs", read this: Beachballs- Computer seems slower than it used to? Read this for some slow computer tips: Speedup- Almost full hard drive? Some solutions. Out of Space- Apple Battery Info. Battery

so just to be clear. The 8GB was ram that came out of my friend's mac.

Mac's can't use faster memory than what it originally had? (I'm a recent toe dipper in the mac pond)

Just to be clear: it's nothing to do with being faster and everything to do with being DIFFERENT RAM. With rare exceptions, no Mac can use RAM that's different than the ones it shipped with (other than changes in capacity, of course).